GOING IT ALONE And Other Conundrums of the Spiritual Life in a New Age James Ishmael Ford 24 April 2010 A Sermon delivered at the Annual Meeting of the Ballou Channing District of the Unitarian Universalist Association A couple of years ago I was sitting in my office with a younger colleague. We were talking about church growth and particularly our shared perceived need to attract younger people, roughly in my friend’s age bracket. I was enthusiasing with ideas, positively... Read more

 Read more

Some rather clever person figured out that as William Shakespeare was baptized on April the 25th (although I also found another source that says he was baptized on the 26th…), he would have been born on this day in 1564, unless, of course, you think there never was a Shakespeare and that Frances Bacon has been robbed, unless it was Christopher Marlowe, or perhaps Edward de Vere. Or somebody else, anyone other than the grasping and unworthy son of a... Read more

may there be many more earth days to come… Read more

John Muir was born on this day in 1838… Read more

I write this reflection on Adolf Hitler’s one hundred and twenty-first birthday. It triggers in my mind that telling and unsettling remark from Bertrand Russell, “the whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.” There should be little doubt about one thing. We live in perilous times. Our republic is sharply divided. Those unhappy with the current administration are waving signs with messages like “this... Read more

On this day in 1927 Mae West was sentenced to serve ten days on a charge of obscenity resulting from the production of her play Sex. Read more

GOD IS NOT YOUR UNCLE James Ishmael Ford 18 April 2010 A sermon delivered at the First Unitarian Church of Providence, Rhode Island Text Then the Divine answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said, who is this who despairs without knowledge? Pull yourself together. I have questions for you, and you must answer. Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you understand. Who measured out the universe; do you understand? Who gave... Read more

According to some people on this day in 1397, before the king, James II and his court, Geoffrey Chaucer first tells his Canterbury Tales. People have run with it ever since… Read more

Brad Warner at his blog posts a standup sending up religion. Pretty funny. Even a real point, if perhaps not the strongest of ’em. Made me think of Eddie Izzard, who also takes on religion in interesting ways… And to even things up… Read more